On Day 3 Of Shutdown, It's Deja Vu All Over Again

A gate leading into the Joshua Tree National Park California is latched (though not locked) because of the partial government shutdown. Though national parks are technically closed, national forests remain open — they're too large to close.

She also noted that in the "political life cycles" of shutdowns, "this is just the beginning." Judging from past experiences, it takes about 7 days for public anger over closed offices, barricaded parks and lost federal business to build. We're only into Day 3.

With little to say other than that the shutdown continues and the two sides aren't showing any signs — at least in public — of shifting, the news certainly does have a "deja vu all over again" feel.

So are there any reasons to think there could be a breakthrough anytime soon?

In her report, Mara said there is a suggestion from some that if the White House and the president's Democratic allies would agree to one relatively small change to the new health care program, that might give Republicans a "face-saving" way to drop their opposition to funding the government.

What might that relatively small change be? Repealing a tax on medical devices, Mara says.

There's also word from the conservative-leaning National Review and some other news outlets that House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, "wants to craft a 'grand bargain' on fiscal issues as part of the debt-limit deliberations. ... He's looking at potentially blending a government-spending deal and debt-limit agreement into a larger budget package." He and President Obama came close to a "grand bargain" in 2011.

But perhaps we should turn back to Yogi for the last word on all this. As he once said, "it ain't over 'til it's over."

Reprising what he's been saying for several days now, President Obama just told a crowd in Rockville, Md., that a "reckless Republican shutdown" threatens to send the economy into a tailspin and is hurting "hundreds of thousands of Americans [who] suddenly aren't receiving their paychecks."

Republican leaders, of course, have been saying it's the president and his Democratic colleagues who are at fault.